As usual, Andie Rose has a plan: Transfer from community college to the hyper competitive Blue Ridge State, major in psychology, and maintain her lifelong goal of becoming an iconic self-help figure despite the nerves that have recently thrown her for a loop. All it will take is ruthless organization, hard work, and her trademark unrelenting enthusiasm to pull it all together.
But the moment Andie arrives, the rest of her plans go off the rails. Her rocky relationship with her boyfriend Connor only gets more complicated when she discovers he transferred out of Blue Ridge to her community college. Her roommate Shay needs a major, and despite Andie’s impressive track record of being The Fixer, she’s stumped on how to help. And Milo, her coffee-guzzling grump of an R.A. with seafoam green eyes, is somehow disrupting all her ideas about love and relationships one sleep-deprived wisecrack at a time.
But sometimes, when all your plans are in rubble at your feet, you find out what you’re made of. And when Andie starts to find the power of her voice as the anonymous Squire on the school’s legendary pirate radio station–the same one her mom founded, years before she passed away–Andie learns that not all the best laid plans are necessarily the right ones.
Filled with a friend group that feels like family, an empowering journey of finding your own way, and a Just Kiss Already! romance, Begin Again is an unforgettable novel of love and starting again.
- Title: Begin Again
- Author: Emma Lord
- Publisher: Wednesday Books
- Publication Date: January 24, 2023
- Genre: Contemporary, Romance
- Source: Digital ARC via Netgalley / Publishers in exchange for an honest review)
- Targeted Age Range: YA
- Content Warnings: Mentioned parental death (car accident, cancer), grief, absentee parenting, cheating (not main characters), blood (chapter 19), mentions of underage drinking
- Rating: ★★★★★
It’s no secret that I am a huge Emma Lord fan. I’ve obsessively read all of her books, and often turn to them when I’m in need of a comfort read. So I have been very excited about her newest novel, Begin Again, and let me tell you, it met all my expectations and exceeded them. I know that I say this every single time she releases a book, but I really do think that Begin Again is my new favorite.
Begin Again had all the things I’ve come to expect from an Emma Lord novel. Well-developed characters, a-plus friendships, lots of humor and heart, and of course, musical theatre and Taylor Swift references. From the very beginning, I was hooked and I didn’t want to put it down. I definitely sacrificed some sleep to read this book! I also liked that while Lord’s previous books focused on high school students (as most YA does), Begin Again follows Andie during her first semester of college. It was nice to have that change of pace, and I think that allowed more possibilities in the storytelling, especially when it came to Andie learning more about her parents’ time as undergrads at Blue Ridge State.
I loved the college campus setting — the grounds at Blue Ridge State sounded absolutely stunning, especially the area with the arboretum, and I found myself wishing that I could go there. With ribbon scavenger hunts, trivia nights, dorm wide games of Werewolf (also known as Mafia), snowman making competitions and snowball fights, bagel restaurants, and early morning secret radio shows…what’s not to love?! As a mystery girlie, the mystery about the radio show The Knight’s Watch and who the voice of the Knight was definitely appealed to me!
One of Lord’s biggest strengths is character development and I just think she knocked it out of the park this time around. From the very beginning I loved and was rooting for Andie, which only continued as the book went on. Andie is a character that I found very relatable; there were many moments where she would say things or react in a certain way, and I could see myself doing the same thing. I understood a lot of her hopes, and fears — in fact, I felt very called out throughout the course of this book because of how deeply I could relate to her.
“I want to love and be loved without ever having to wonder if it’s conditional. I want a life that is sometimes just my own, without feeling like I’m responsible for anyone or anyone is burdened with being responsible for me”
More than anything, this book is about Andie’s personal growth. It’s about Andie finding herself and starting to heal from the hurt and grief that she’s carried since losing her mom to cancer, and mending her relationship with her father. Though bubbly, warm, and personable, Andie had a lot of walls up which makes sense considering she was just entering her teenage years when her mom died. I was so proud of her for opening herself up to new people and experiences as the book went on, and for finally talking through her feelings with her dad. Grieving is not a linear process, and you never fully get over the pain of losing someone you love, but overtime that pain transforms itself and you can look back on your memories with happiness, and I thought that Andie’s journey to that healing process was really beautiful.
Andie has a big heart, and she loves to help people — in high school, and while she was attending community college in her hometown, she ran an anonymous advice column. I really loved that about her, and understood the need and want to help those around you. She also has deep seated abandonment issues, which really drives her need to help others, as she wants to not be seen as a burden, which…yeah, I get that. Sometimes she could meddle, but I thought that she did a great job of backing off when asked to, and she never pushed her friends too far out of their comfort zones. Instead, she listened and would encourage them without pressuring them to do something that they didn’t want to do.
The friendships in this book are my absolute favorite! The All-Knighters — Andie, Milo, Shay, and Val — are my favorite Lord friend group to date. They all had different personalities and paths, but blended together so seamlessly. They were supportive and encouraging to one another, but not afraid to tell it like it is and never hesitated to help each other.
There was a specific situation involving both Andie and Val that I think could’ve easily turned into a name-calling, blame game situation, and instead of falling into that trap, Lord made it clear that the two have each other’s backs no matter what, and I truly appreciated it. Shay and Andie were just the cutest roommates — their instant friendship was really sweet, and reminded me of how easy it was to bond with the people in my theatre conservatory when I was in college, and I liked how Shay looked out for Andie from the start. I thought it was great that Lord had Shay be unsure of what she wanted to major in and what she wanted to do with her life, and made it clear that she wasn’t lazy or unmotivated, she just didn’t know, which is SO valid of her. I loved her passion for books and that she was a bookstagrammer — her account sounded really amazing and I wish I could follow her! Additionally, she’s a fellow Pisces, so obviously I love her.
The relationship between Andie and Milo was the absolute definition of grumpy-sunshine —- Milo’s the grumpy, Andie’s the sunshine —- and it was EVERYTHING. With his snarky personality and caffeine addiction, I knew that I’d love Milo right away, and of course, I did. He was really funny and made me laugh throughout the book, but I loved his capacity to care for others. Milo is the RA for the dorm that Andie is in, and while he seems a little prickly at the start, he really cared for everyone and was looking out for them. I also loved that he had a customized mug with photos of the chickens his mother raises, that just was the cutest thing (also I know that the girls tease him about that and the fact that he can recognize them, but Andie recognized one of them so…)
I’m a firm believer in having a strong friendship as the foundation to a relationship and I loved the friendship that Milo and Andie created. In fact, I was more invested in their friendship than them getting together romantically — which to be clear, I was in favor of right away, but considering that Andie was in a long distance relationship for the majority of the book, I was more focused on their friendship since we knew that they’d eventually get together. Both Milo and Andie have a lot of walls up, and are hesitant to share some of the more personal aspects of their lives, but they opened up so easily to one another and it just felt completely natural. They challenged and listened to one another, and it’s obvious that there is a deep level of respect between the two. They just made sense and I loved everything about their relationship.
“Go out and make the most of it, because every day is a chance to begin again”
Begin Again felt like a warm hug and a reminder that even when it feels like it’s not true, you are enough, you’re not a burden and even if things are hard right now, you have the strength to get through it. This book made me laugh and cry, and I know that I’ll be revisiting it many many times.
Links for Begin Again: Goodreads | TheStoryGraph | Bookshop | IndieBound
Emma Lord (she/her) is a digital media editor and writer living in New York City, where she spends whatever time she isn’t writing either running or belting show tunes in community theater. She graduated from the University of Virginia with a major in psychology and a minor in how to tilt your computer screen so nobody will notice you updating your fan fiction from the back row. She was raised on glitter, a whole lot of love, and copious amounts of grilled cheese. Her books include Tweet Cute, You Have a Match, and When You Get the Chance.
